Trust Issues
by Hedgi
Summary: Inspired by the first few seconds of the deleted scene from 1x10, as well as implications from episodes 16-18. Cisco knows when people Don't Trust him. He understands. He's young, and naive, and thoughtless sometimes, and he can't blame them, for doubting him. Not when he's gotten people hurt, when he's made the mistakes he has. He's used to it, honestly. But it still hurts.


Trust Issues

Cisco's used to not being believed, not being trusted. It used to hurt. He tells himself it doesn't matter, that as long as he knows he's a Good Person, that's all that matters. That the only thing there is to do is keep being that person, and hope someday everyone figures it out.  
It still hurts.

* * *

As a kid, his teachers watched him taking tests. They kept a hawk's eye on his wobbly handwriting it, and when they saw it on another kid's homework they swooped in—because of course, he must have gotten Jake to do his homework, Jake Puckett was a Good Kid. Never mind that it was the same handwriting on Cisco's tests and projects, getting neater by the day, his spelling still a little hazy but otherwise fine. Never mind that witnesses, if there were any who could be bribed into stepping forward by the principal, muttered that Puckett and his crew started the fights, backing scrawny little Cisco into a corner until desperation helped his fists and he blackened eyes.  
It was the same story, over, and over, and over.  
He built himself a button video camera, and a recorder pen that worked better than the stuff in toyshops.  
But when it came down to someone's word, Cisco knew who'd be believed. Not him. Never him. Not even his own parents, sometimes.  
There was nothing to do but get used to it.

* * *

Cisco sat heavily, and ran a hand through his hair, shoving it from his eyes. Barry didn't trust him. Of course he didn't, why should he? Cisco had Messed Up. He'd gotten someone hurt—someone killed, and the thought of it felt like ice spreading along this veins. Barry thought the gun had been meant for him. Cisco couldn't blame him for thinking it, didn't try to explain past the first angry rise in Barry's voice. It hadn't been for Barry Allen, the—well, not friend, not any more, he guessed. It had been for the guy he didn't know yet, he wasn't sure of, because trust is a tricky thing and so many whatifs swirled in his head and he wanted a failsafe.  
And then there was always the man in yellow that Barry had mentioned, a ball of lightning, too fast to catch, too fast to stop. Cisco had built the gun to stop him as much as—as—Barry.  
The others were right, he should have said, he should have told everyone what he was building, and why—in case you get put under mind control, that always happens in comics, or what if something happens and you can't slow down?—but what good would saying that now do? He should have known better.  
He had to find a way to fix this, to stop this murderer cold. Even if it wouldn't win back what he'd already lost.

* * *

"How are we supposed to trust anything from STAR Labs after you Nuked the city?" one cop asks, mockingly, and Cisco bites down on his "it was an accident" and "oh my god it wasn't a nuke if it had been you would be dead/dying" and "how am I supposed to trust cops after all those brown kids getting shot up?" because antagonizing the people he's trying to save won't fix anything. They'll either trust him, or they won't, and if they won't, fine. He gets it.  
"Yeah," he says, swallowing, trying to think up the right words—and damn, he's glad they don't know that he's the one who invented the Cold Gun in the first place. "Yeah, you shouldn't trust us. What happened, that was our fault," and he goes on, hoping to at least convince them that he wants to help, that he doesn't care if they trust him, but this tech is there to save them, so try to trust it, at least.  
He can tell they don't, really, when Singh gives a grunted "Test dummies are one thing. My officers are another." But Cisco hopes, hopes, hopes that the shields will protect these men and women, who still look at him like he's kicked a puppy.  
The tech works. That, at least, was trustworthy.

* * *

Cisco's taking the guns, gingerly, and putting them in the incinerator, ready to melt them into unrecognizable goop once and for all, guilt prickling through him that he created these. Yeah, they were—were cool, but… But Barry was right. There's nothing cool about criminals hurting people, and so many people got hurt. Because of him. STAR labs is no place for weapons.  
"I swear to you all," he tells them earnestly, because Caitlin's still rubbing her fingertips where they grazed the cold of her car last night and Barry's hurting, his suit in tatters, "I will _never_ make anything that can harm anyone like that ever again. Never, ever."  
And instead of leaving it at that, which he'd expected, or a word of reassurance, which he'd told himself he wasn't aching to here, Caitlin leans over to Dr. Wells.

"How long do you give him?" she asks soft but he can still hear it. His hearing's gotten better, and it hurts that she'd think that—that his promise to her, of all people, meant nothing.

"One week," he answers without hesitation.  
Barry, easing to his feet, mutters "Won't take that bet."

Cisco's face burns and he ducks his head, letting his hair cover his face.  
After everything, it's still clear. They don't really trust him. Why should they? He's younger than them, by years, and—and he's messed so much up. He almost got them killed, honestly and truly killed—if not for Joe—for Eddie… And that's his fault and it's on him and of course they don't trust him.  
He hides the disappointed acceptance with a quote, and powers the incinerator on.

* * *

It's not a week. Cisco lasts longer than that, but it's worse, and all he can think as he feels the small cuts around his eye and tries to keep Dante upright, is that now any chance at trust is gone. Forever. There's no place for him at STAR now. Not with what he's just done, not with the choices he's made in the last 24 hours.  
He tries to tell himself that maybe—maybe they'd understand, but he knows they won't. He promised he'd never make weapons again, and he handed three to their enemies, just gave in, caved, collapsed.  
If it had just been him, maybe he could have been stronger. He hopes he would have—knows he would have, because he's not Peter-freaking-Petrigrew. Barry's the closest thing he's ever had to a best friend, and now…  
Now he's just done the impossible, betrayed him, given up his name at the click of a trigger on a gun he gave the villain himself.  
Never mind that he had to save Dante. Never mind that he couldn't let someone else pay for his mistakes, because now—God. Joe, Iris, Henry-everyone Barry cares about will be in danger, and it's all because he wasn't smart enough. Couldn't find a way out, a third option, like he should have.  
Like he should have.  
No one will ever want to speak to him again, once they know. Joe'd probably kill him, if he could get away with it, they'll all be so angry. They'll hate him, and shake their heads, and say they knew they shouldn't have trusted him.  
He's so tired, and he just wants to face them, get his candy stash and lucky pens, and get out. Admit the truth to them, and go. Maybe he can find a job somewhere in Canada.  
He's used to people not trusting him, but this time, knowing that he took that trust, however small it was, and shattered it with both hands with a single name and a night-into-dawn's worth of building—that hurts.  
Cisco makes sure Dante's safe inside the hospital before swallowing his fear and making his way to STAR. He tells himself, practicing what he'll say, the bruise pulsing in his cheekbone like shame, that he did it to save his brother, but it sounds like excuses. He broke his promise. He betrayed a hero.  
But he has to face them, tell them before Barry gets led into a trap.  
Unless it's already too late.

* * *

Barry and Caitlin and Wells hugged him and told him it was ok, that they didn't blame him, that they understood, that they were just glad he was alive. Barry even went as far as to say it was his own fault, but Cisco didn't quite buy it. He was the one who built the guns. He was the one who gave in. They said it didn't matter, that he hadn't proved himself untrustworthy, unworthy to be part of the team.  
They told him it was ok, and he wanted so badly to believe them—  
So he did.  
But Barry was getting edgier around—well, around all of them, but Cisco noticed it. Second guessing, and doubting, and then the bees.  
Cisco feels sick, watching Barry's vitals suddenly bottom out, and runs his hands through his hair, praying that the defibrillator works. And then he's back, gasping, and relief sets in.  
But it's not over and it's not ok, because Barry's angry, and Cisco—understands. He made a mistake, and Barry paid for it. Felicity tries to make it into a joke—because Trust is something other people think is so simple that it's waved away, he guesses. He wonders, working with the Arrow, shouldn't she know better? But at the same time he wishes she were right, that he knew for certain that Barry knew for true that Cisco didn't do it on purpose. That he didn't know that the company hadn't filed the updated blueprints. That he would never try to get Barry killed—he'd rather die than do that, because the world needs Barry Allen, needs the Flash.  
There are plenty of tech guys and engineers. The world doesn't really need him.  
And the worst thing is that _that_ isn't the worst thing. That the newfound shadows in Barry's eyes, in Joe's eyes, and the whispered conversations he can almost hear, the clear distrust ever since—ever since Snart—isn't the worst.  
It hurts, but Cisco's long resigned to having to constantly earn trust, and never quite reach it.  
The worst is that he's starting to doubt even himself. His own memories aren't what they should be, he remembers—things that he shouldn't, because they didn't happen.  
The tawny, staticky memories have to just be—dreams, stress hallucinations, something. Because Doctor Wells—he's paralyzed. He's paralyzed, and he's been so good to Cisco, second chance after second chance, calling him the closest thing he's ever had to a son—but that memory, which should be a comfort, isn't. It's overlaid and underlaid with the sound of his own heart, terrified, and the feeling of tears and what comes beyond panic, when panic and fear won't do any good, looking death in the face.  
But it's not real, because in the memory—dreams, in the dreams, Harrison Wells isn't who he says, and he crushes his heart, and—and Cisco knows he's alive, so that can't have happened.  
Still, he wishes he had answers.  
No one really trusts him, he thinks, and he can't even trust himself.

* * *

But then Ray trusts him when he hesitates for a heartbeat and tells him to dive into the bay, promising to catch him.  
And Caitlin trusts him when he asks her to cover for him, enough to go along with it.  
And Laurel trusts him enough to take him aside, reveal who she is, and ask for his tech skills, his, by name.  
And Joe trusts him to have his back in the sewer.  
And Iris trusts him to be able to build something that works, without Wells, to save the shattered family she has.  
And Barry trusts him. To build something impossible, to have his back, to tell him the truth.  
Barry trusts him to be able to remember. Wants him to remember. So that this whole tangled knot of a family and the last year and a half isn't truly erased, so that their friendship—and that's what it is—isn't lost. Barry trusts him, and he allows himself to trust that, too. Finally, finally, Cisco thinks he understands, and even if this is all about to change, knowing these things is good. It hardly seems fair that now, when things finally seem solid, now that he knows where he stands with the people he wants to call his family, it's all going to vanish, but Barry trusts him to remember. He'll find a way, too. To bring this little team back together, across time and space and multiverses.

* * *

Fin.

"Trust" no longer looks like a real world.  
I hope I gave you feels.


End file.
